The fall season of the Ottawa International Writers Festival begins October 23, 2024. The best way to attend is to get a full festival pass —$160 for access to all events. It’s a great deal, and for the first time ever, OIWF are running a Festival contest!
If you get a patronship by the end of the month (before October 31, 2024), you will get the best seats in the house for every event until the end of the year, a tax receipt to even the cost with our Festival pass, AND you will also be entered into a draw to
A book-lover's dream.
The full festival schedule is available on their website. Not sure what to see? Check out the synopsis they've provided for each event below. Plan to attend October 23 - 27, at the Library of Archives Canada 395 Wellington Street. Books will be available on site for purchase courtesy of Perfect Books.
North of Nowhere: Marie Wilson, one of the commissioners of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, honours the voices of survivors determined to heal, reclaim, and thrive. Self Be True: A conversation with acclaimed novelists whose new books explore the struggle to be true to oneself in a world built on colonial structures of oppression and control. Imagined Histories: Join us for a journey into invented history, fantastic powers and hidden forces battling for control of the world. Remembered Tomorrows: Join Suyi Davies Okungbowa and Nalo Hopkinson on a journey into the ways speculative fiction speaks to the present tense from possible tomorrows and imagined histories. Beast: Join us for a lunchtime chat, a conversation on craft and a taste of this spirited tale that pits the powers of tradition against the pull of a vengeful past. One Life to Live: Three brilliant novelists whose new books explore the ways we hide and the ways we are found as we forge our path in the world. Poetry Cabaret: Four dynamic poets from across the country read their works and chat with one another about where we come from and where we are. Our Green Heart: Botanist, biochemist, biologist and poet of the global forest, Diana Beresford-Kroeger, delivers a challenge to us all to dig deeper into the science of forests and how they can save us from climate breakdown. Just Say Yes: CBC’s Bob McDonald is the household Voice of Science. Come and learn about the fascinating life that made the fascinating man. Brave New World: Explore the nightmares of technology and a guided tour of possible tomorrows with two science fiction writers at the top of their craft. Eye of the Beholder: Join two prize-winning novelists in a conversation about cults, academia, art and mysticism. Dangerous Liaisons: Someone’s getting murdered and someone is going to solve it. Join our mystery writers for some thrills, chills and sleuthing. Love to Be Loved: Romance is in the air! Join author Emma Theriault for a conversation with three of Canada’s most celebrated Romance writers on all the ways true love comes knocking, often when least expected. On Leonard Cohen: Take in an evening of live music and conversation about National Treasure (and patron saint of Montreal) Leonard Cohen. The Peace: We’re honoured to present The Peace: A Warrior's Journey by General Roméo Dallaire, who shows us the past, present and future of war through the prism of his own life. Shadows of Tyranny: Historian Ken McGoogan delves into dictatorships of the twentieth century to sound this crucial alarm about the possibility of democratic collapse in US and its implications for Canada. Allies and Enemies: Join CBC’s Nahlah Ayed and the Canadian War Museum’s Tim Cook to discuss how spies and soldiers in World War II helped stop the fascist threat. What She Said: Elizabeth Renzetti looks at the myriad systems holding women back in 2024 and what we can do to break those structures down. Salvage: Canadian National treasure Dionne Brand returns with her first non-fiction book in more than 20 years to explore 17th, 18th and 19th-century English and American literature—and the colonial aesthetic that shaped her sense of self and the world, of what was possible and what was not. Recognizing the Stranger: Nine days before October 7, 2023, Isabella Hammad delivered the Edward W. Said Memorial Lecture at Columbia University. The text of her seminal speech and her afterword, written in the early weeks of 2024, together make up a searing appraisal of the war on Palestine during what seems a turning point in the narrative of human history. The Political Pen
Fiction. We close the Fall Edition with the spotlight on three acclaimed novelists and poets whose works explore the ways community is shaped and defined by history and political violence. Writing from and about occupied territories, these three remarkable talents speak to a universal need to be free.
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